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Avalon wrote:
Can you use Boot Camp or Parallels to run RTS on your Mac?

Since PC users are moving to Mac in droves (yea!), you would think that Mac compatibility would be a major area of concern for RTS.

RTS has a very good, stable scalable solution which dollar for dollar is hard to beat. It is a company and product which was created by a theatre owner and first hand knowledge of needs, requirements and proceedures. RTS's product has evolved over the years and their continued years of business serve sound proof to the reliability and popularity of their product.

As important as selecting a ticketing system also is a well planned network. All too often I see theatre owners and managers placing countless hours of research and evalutation into software while neglecting to consider the full implications of networking.

While it is agreed that software either in the capacity of buy-out or annual licensing cost is one of the largest cost factors to consider, it is also important to remember the underlying network.

Simply throwing together an unmanaged network with a switch, router for internet and some some computers together does indeed function, this methodology ignores this infrastructure and the related and ever-ongoing communication costs are haphazzardly considered.

Just as with any other efficiency, monthly fees paid out for under used or ignored technology is wasteful and a cost center often under appreciated.

When considering ticketing software and networks also consider in most cases this network remains idle with minimal traffic every day. By incorporating smart switching technology and appropriate voice services, it is possible to reduce or eliminate long distance charges calling between locations within your organization, improve employee productivity and customer satisfaction.

Call My Cinema is a voice solution which makes efficient use of this underlying network capacity and has the capabilities of delivering live calls to your theatres without requiring additional phone lines. Even without internet into your location this product can provide showtime and announcement services for up to 20 simultaneous callers for unbeatable prices.

Guess I don't quite understand what one has to do with the other, B2B.

I understand you're trying to advertise your service, which you've done on a couple of other occasions here. However, since your offering doesn't use the customer's local network in the first place, am I not correct in saying you really don't have an effect on it, one way or the other?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but my impression is that your offering a multi-line service that is simply call-forwarded from the customer's number, whether that be by simple call forward or some combination of call forward busy / no answer.

I'd be interested in examples of your concern about network construction. Frankly, most of the setups I've seen revolving around RTS are just what you describe... simple LANs... either a cable or DSL modem, a firewall/router and maybe a switch and/or hub or two. They're simple, and they work well.

Cinemateer wrote:
Hmmmmmmmmm..

Methinks you've been watching too many of those Mac / PC commercials

Ha ha! As brilliant and hilarious as those Apple commercials are, it's actually a statistical reality that more PC users are switching to Apple than ever in history. I often kick myself for not doing it years ago. Bullet-proof OS compared to error-ridden, oft-crashing OS... it's not rocket science.

But back on subject, for Avalon, seriously, you should be able to boot your Mac into PC mode using Parallels and it will act exactly like a PC... but without all the errors, messages, and problems associated with Microsoft, of course. Depending on how the RTS software is made, you may even be able to use Boot Camp to switch between your Mac OS and RTS without rebooting.

The topic at hand is ticketing systems, and an intregal part that deserves consideration just as other hardware and software selections is how they are networked.

As technology continues to progress forward, i.p. network connectivity is quickly becoming a part of many types of equipment. As more and more facets of cinema "go digital" from equipment in sound racks, automation equipment, auditorium signage, closed circuit monitoring systems, audio distribution, voip and many other presently available and emerging technologies continue to be more widely deployed, owners and operators stand to gain great advantage from buying wisely once rather than repurchasing and replacing inadequate infrastructure as these various components all start to share the same network.

Many of the afforementioned uses of a local i.p. network require consistent flow of data. Often times bandwidth requirements are fairly nominal as long as delivery can be achieved consistently. Smart switches and devices which communicate quality of service characteristics and intelligently pass network traffic according to priority facilitates this.

B2B Phone Services wrote:
On the surface, what you say is true. However, I'm doubtful that this means a lot to most theatre owners. At its peak most probably wouldn't strain the simplest of networks.

Does anyone here know if a digital cinema uses the same network for its POS, advertising and digital projection equipment? I would tend to think the projectors would be on its own, but I don't know that for sure. Security aside, that's probably where most of your network activity would be.

Off-topic a bit, I'd like to know a little more about your phone service. The price seems reasonable for something that would reliably manage outgoing announcements.

Jack
Rodeo
PCs forever!

I've used Sensible Cinema software and RTS software. RTS charges more for licensing on each terminal. Sensible was less expensive, and most likely a better choice for a small theatre of one to three screens. Both have Concession software. I liked RTS software more, and the concession software portion was very easy to train staff. Both companies have very good service. Rusty from Sensible is a super guy. The staff from RTS is unbeatable. They can actually log on and help you with your location problems, while talking to you over the phone. RTS has a great showtime scheduler included with their software.

We have RTS in one theatre and do it by hand (talk to my wife) in the other. In the one we have incredibly simple and detailed information and in the other: whatever we choose to manually keep and manually research. URG. I have zero complaints about RTS and all I know is it works and works well. What would I like to see: per cap per logged in staff member